|
The MEM Seminar Series 2005/2006
|
Abstract
Public decision-making and policies should ideally reflect an understanding
of the public's values. This is true of public projects and programmes and
even more so where they involve non-market goods of which the environment
occupies a large component. Because society's values about the environment
are not generally expressed in the marketplace, non-market goods valuation
has, overtime, become an important input into government decision-making.
That the price of such environmental goods and services are not readily
revealed by way of the market does not mean that these goods have little or
no values. It requires however an indirect approach
to imputed values. Increasing concerns over environmental degradation have
amplified the role of environmental economics and the necessity of valuing
non-pecuniary environmental resources as tools of analysis to facilitate the
optimal design of policies. As this talk is intended for a general audience,
the subject of what is meant by economic valuation will be introduced. Why do
we need valuation in monetary terms and if so, how do economists price nature
are some of the topics discussed here. The talk will include a taxonomy of environmental values, monetary valuation
techniques, and benefit-cost analysis. References are also made to one
multiple good valuation method, namely the method of binary choice paired
comparisons which can be used for valuing a wide range of environmental
goods. Where possible, real examples for illustration purposes will be
utilized.
About the
speaker
Euston Quah is Associate Professor and Head of Economics at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He publishes
widely in the fields of environmental economics, cost-benefit analysis, law
and economics, and household economics. Among some of his 40 over journal
publications include Environment and Planning : Series A and C; Journal of
Environmental Management; World Development; Journal of Environmental Law;
Journal of Public Economic Theory; American Journal of Economics and
Sociology; Applied Economics; and in the International Review of Law and
Economics. He has also published some 5 books with major international
publishers (such as McGraw-Hill, Edward Elgar, and Ashgate);
the latest with Routledge,
UK with
a forthcoming title, Cost-Benefit Analysis with E.J. Mishan;
and a book on Microeconomics: Asian Perspectives with Gregory Mankiw, forthcoming in 2007, to be published by Thomson.
One of his books was listed by the International Library of Critical Writings
in Economics in 2004, and his works have been reviewed favourably in the
Journal of Economic Literature, the Economic Journal, and in the Journal of
Labour Economics. In 2005, he was invited as one of twelve eminent speakers
in the Asia-Pacific by UNESCAP for the Eminent Environmental Economists
Symposium held in conjunction with the Ministerial Conference on Environment
and Development in Seoul,
Korea.
Prof Quah was a former Vice-Dean of
the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences; Deputy Director of the Public Policy
Programme; Founding Director of the Singapore Centre for Policy and Applied
Economics; and Acting Head of Economics at NUS. He has also been an advisor
to several Ministries and Statutory Boards in Singapore contributing to studies
on cost-benefit analysis of public projects and programmes in addition to
being a consultant to major international agencies. Professor Quah's study on air pollution had been acknowledged as
the first of its kind for Singapore
by the Ministry of the Environment as well as the first study on the social
cost of smoking in Singapore. He was a member of the Programme Management
Committee of the MSc (Environmental Management) Programme at NUS.
|
